


Tidal

by blanketed_in_stars



Series: 52 Weeks of Wolfstar [23]
Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: 1993, Azkaban, Escape, M/M, Memories, Post-Marauders' Era, Revenge, Swimming
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-06-19
Updated: 2015-06-19
Packaged: 2018-04-05 03:52:23
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,384
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4164678
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/blanketed_in_stars/pseuds/blanketed_in_stars
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The rat is Peter, there's no doubt about it, yet he brings the paper closer, rapt. For a moment, many moments, he doesn't feel anything but a stunned, reeling disbelief. Then something sparks in his head and all his thoughts go up in flames.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Tidal

**Author's Note:**

> Week 23

Padfoot's ears twitch, hearing something different. Not the chains, not the ocean, not the screaming—crisp tones, the sort he hasn't heard outside of his dreams in twelve years. He sniffs the air and smells tea with sugar and cream, and aftershave. It's almost an overwhelming assault on his delicate canine senses. But then he hears something else beneath the voices: footsteps, coming closer.

He shifts, pulls the change over himself. Fur sinks through skin, bones pop into alignment, vision grows brighter and hearing grows muffled. The memories and the pain return, too, but he can still hear the voices, and now he can force himself to understand what they're saying.

“…think, Minister, we had better return soon. That delegation from the Rwandan Spirit Division still wants to have supper with you.”

“I remember, Dolores. I think we’ve made the rounds, but there’s one more I’d like to visit personally, make sure everything’s in order.”

Sirius rises from the floor and peers out of the little barred window on his door. A light has appeared down the hall. After a moment he realizes what it is—their Patronuses precede them, casting a silver glow on the damp stones. Sirius squints in the brightness and sees an emu strutting along, and behind it, a Persian cat.

When they reach him, he presses against the bars, yearning for some bit of warmth and hope, but the enchantments keep him isolated. His disappointment lets the misery overwhelm him for a moment. But then the casters’ footsteps slow and here they are, real people, in front of him. Sirius opens his eyes.

The man on the other side of the door regards him with surprise. “My word, Dolores,” Fudge says, nervously twisting his grip on what looks like a newspaper.

A short, squat woman comes forward out of the shadows. “This is the one, then, Minister? This is Sirius Black?”

Sirius drags himself out of a memory, _an owl, his mother’s shrieks, the Gryffindor table staring,_ and says, in his best Black voice, “Pleasure to meet you.”

Both of them startle; Sirius swears that Fudge’s feet actually leave the ground. Their gazes harden. “I can’t say the same,” the woman, Dolores, says, her voice somehow sweet and cold at once. She says something else, too, but Sirius is fascinated by her very pink and very frilly robes. They look like candy in this place.

When it seems she's finished, Sirius looks expectantly at Fudge. He must have something to say—perhaps not as lengthy as Dolores, but surely the Minister of Magic would like to tell him a few things. Fudge just looks back at him, a little uncertain, a little afraid. Sirius doesn't like it. The silence stretches on and on, and oh, _the Willow frozen, terror in his veins, James's fist rushing at him._ "Is that the _Prophet?"_ he asks. Anything but remembering.

Fudge jumps again. "Yes," he says. Sirius gets the feeling it's an automatic response.

"Have you finished with it?" Sirius clears his throat to get rid of the cobwebs.

"Finished…?"

"If you are, could I—?" Sirius doesn't quite know what to do with Fudge staring at him like that. "It's just," he explains, "it's been a few years since I last read it. And the crossword, I've missed that, too." He hasn't got a quill or even a muggle pen, but he'll puzzle it out somehow.

Fudge blinks and looks at Dolores, but she won't save him. He gives a little shrug and sticks the rolled-up paper through the bars.

Sirius takes it and nearly falls. Warmth floods through him from his fingertips, spreading lightning-fast and merciful. For an instant his head is clear and he is safe, and just as quickly, Fudge lets go of the paper. The hope is gone. But Sirius feels better for having felt it. A moment later, he realizes there are tears in his eyes, on his cheeks.

Fudge and Dolores are already hurrying away, talking loudly about the Rwandan delegation again. Sirius whispers his thanks down the corridor after them and takes shelter on the floor in the corner, as far away as he can get from the dementors that have already returned to their stations just outside his door.

The paper is now permanently bent from Fudge's tight grip, but Sirius lays it flat and stares. Words. Something about Quidditch, cauldron bottoms, the price of aconite, Celestina Warbeck's new husband. Sirius barely reads, just relishes the print and the knowledge that there are other people who have touched what he is touching now. He presses his face to the paper as if he can feel them.

After several minutes of savoring, Sirius turns to the pictures. It's almost more than he can stand to see so many faces again; for twelve years it's been only him and the ghosts and the walls. He pores over men, women, children. A photograph of a whole family, laughing into the camera somewhere much warmer than here, arms around each other's shoulders—

Sirius's heart nearly stops. The rat is Peter, there's no doubt about it, yet he brings the paper closer, rapt. For a moment, many moments, he doesn't feel anything but a stunned, reeling disbelief. Then something sparks in his head and all his thoughts go up in flames. There, right there, twitching his whiskers at the camera, is the reason James and Lily are dead, the reason Remus will hate him forever, the reason he is trapped in this dank hole of a cell.

The article is supremely unhelpful, although he thinks faintly of the Prewetts and a rainy funeral when he reads the names. Then, there it is, _…Hogwarts, which five of the Weasley children currently attend…_

He knows how long it's been, has kept track of every day, even the ones where he didn't have a single coherent thought. This is year twelve, and it is June. And if it's 1993, Harry is about to turn thirteen. He's at Hogwarts.

He has to do something, has to get him away from Peter, or get Peter away from him. But he's stuck here. Sirius's heart is beating very fast. He kicks at the wall in his frustration and cries out at the pain—a whimper like a kicked dog. That's when the idea comes to him, in that high-pitched yelp of a sound.

It takes weeks before Sirius can manage it. Weeks of starving himself and focusing on the one thought he can keep straight in his head. He's not happy, but it's the best he's felt in twelve years. He has a plan.

Everything goes more smoothly than he expects: becoming Padfoot, slipping through the bars. He slides into the water and the icy shock bites into him, erasing everything from his frozen brain except the word _Remus._ He swims as hard as he can in order to cover it up—no good has ever come from remembering that.

Yet, try as he might, the memories won't let go.

He's one mile out and Remus is sitting in the cottage kitchen, alone. The sky outside the windows is black and the old lightbulb buzzes, and Sirius steps forward. Remus turns, and his face is wet.

He's three miles out and they're leaving Hogwarts for the last time. The sun is hidden by clouds and although Remus is holding his hand, Sirius feels a horrible weight in the bottom of his stomach. It grows heavier with each step he takes.

He's five miles out and Remus is missing, not in the dormitory, not by the lake—oh, there he is, in the back of the library with his head bent over a book. He looks up and Sirius experiences something like seasickness, only better.

He's eight miles out, he can see the shore, and Remus runs his fingers through Sirius's hair. The branches of the beech tree score the sky like a stained-glass window. They smile, they laugh, Remus bends over to kiss Sirius upside-down and resumes absently combing his hair.

His feet scrape sand and Padfoot comes back to himself. There's no cottage or castle here, but no beech trees either. There's no one to hold his hand, and the fingers in his hair are nothing more than the salt water dragging at his fur.


End file.
